The headlines
are trumpeting the latest
revolution in Kyrgyzstan,
and the average Joe or Jane is bound to ask: Why in the name of all that’s holy
should anyone – even a foreign policy wonk – care about the fate of Kyrgyzstan,
a Central Asian former Soviet “republic” on the edge of nowhere?

This was the millenarian vision energizing the neocons as they rhapsodized
over the possibilities, and millions in overt and covert US government aid were
poured into the coffers of would-be revolutionaries: a whole industry sprang
up feeding on Washington’s largesse. The National
Endowment for Democracy – a neocon citadel since the Reagan era – and USAID,
alongside the covert machinations of other US government agencies, spent a great
deal of the taxpayers’ money sponsoring conferences, conducting “training” schools,
and creating webs sites. Imitating the old Soviet-led Comintern, the neocons
excitedly talked about setting up an American-led democratic “International,”
a proposal mirrored by neocon mouthpiece John McCain’s suggestion that we set
up a “League
of Democracies” to rival and supplant the United Nations.

Armed with plenty of moolah and the sympathy of the Western media, the color
revolutionaries scored a big success in Ukraine,
where the “Orange” movement threw out the pro-Russian, Eastern-dominated government
in a closely fought – and bitterly disputed – election. It was a model example
of the exercise of American “soft power,” regime change without muss or much
fuss, all of it engineered directly
from Washington.

When the regime-changers got to the Middle East, however, they ran into a brick
wall. In Lebanon, where the “Cedar
Revolution” stalled,
and failed, they suffered their first big defeat. In Kyrgyzstan, however, they
had more success: there the pro-Russian president, Askar
Akayev, was deposed in a violent paroxysm of street fighting, mayhem, and
looting. Installed in his place, with direct
US backing, was Kurmanbek
Bakiyev, whose reputation as a murderer and tyrant was already well-established.

On March 17, 2002, demonstrators who were holding a peaceful and legal rally
in support of Azimbek
Beknazarov – a member of parliament campaigning against the cession
of land to China by the Akayev government – were attacked
by the police. Five demonstrators were killed, and as a result of the
public outcry and subsequent investigation, Bakiyev, then prime minister, was
forced
to resign after police responsibility was established.

None of that mattered, however, since the Western media didn’t probe too deeply
into the subject, and was content to focus on their assigned “narrative”: the
“color revolutions” as spontaneous outbursts of “democratic” (not to mention
“pro-American”) fervor. Behind the scenes, however, the US was pulling the strings,
from which dangled plenty of US taxpayer dollars. As the New York Timesreported
at the time:

“The money earmarked for democracy programs in Kyrgyzstan totaled about
$12 million last year. Hundreds of thousands more filters into pro-democracy
programs in the country from other United States government-financed institutions
such as the National Endowment for Democracy. That does not include the money
for the Freedom House printing press or Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Kyrgyz
language service.”

Millions of dollars in direct US aid to “pro-democracy” Kyrgyz organizations
deftly succeeded in giving “Killer” Kurmanbek a complete public relations makeover:
yesterday’s “hardliner”
was held up as the symbol of “democracy” and pro-American liberalism, and practically
everyone saluted. (Not
us, though).

Elinor Burkett, author of So
Many Enemies, So Little Time, an account of her days teaching in Kyrgyzstan,
also resisted the temptation to put the Kyrgyz events in the context of “the
paradigm du jour.” “It’s
a good story,” she wrote in the New York Times, but “akin to stuffing
an elephant into a gorilla skin.” The same is true of those who put the most
recent events – the deposing of Bakiyev and the installation of a new “pro-Russian”
government in Bishkek – in the context of superpower contention, the latest
chapter in the new cold war. As Burkett, who actually knows something about
the region, said of the Tulip Revolution at the height of its success:

“As the wealthy and ambitious jockey for power, the people of Bishkek are
digging out and blaming the self-styled rebels from the south for the destruction
of their city, heaping contempt on what they deem an illiterate peasantry. The
long-standing divide between the two halves of the country – linked by a single,
often impassable road over the mountains – has been ratcheted up. Few in Kyrgyzstan
are basking in the glow of hope that lighted up Ukraine in December. As one
friend in Bishkek said in a recent e-mail message to me: ‘This is not a democracy.
This is just a crowd.’”

Like most of the post-Soviet states that sprung up on the grave of the old
USSR, Kyrgyzstan
is not a nation but an invention of Stalin and his legatees, its borders determined
by administrative fiat and deliberately created to foster division and the break
up of national and linguistic minorities. When the Soviet Union imploded, it
broke up into its constituent administrative units, giving reality to the former
fiction of the Union as a federation of associated “republics.” The old borders
were retained. Thus, “Kyrgyzstan” consists of separate and often antithetical
social and ethnic groups, with the historic divisions between north and south
militating against the probability of a unified “nation” at peace.

The north is “pro-Russian” in the sense that all of the more Westernized, industrialized
regions of the various “republics” in the “near abroad” looked to Moscow for
their cultural cues, and for protection. The Russian influence was the transmission
belt of Westernization and modernity insofar as it penetrated the steppes of
Central Asia.

It is a mistake, however, to interpret events in Bishkek into the language
of a new cold war between the US and a “resurgent” Russia: yet this misperception
will remain popular so long as the future of the Manas air base is the main
focus of US coverage of what’s going on there. As usual with the Americans,
it’s all
about them.

And in a sense, it is, because Kyrgyz opposition to the US presence is based
on bitter experience. An experience that occurred to Alexander
Ivanov, when he tried to pass through a truck stop checkpoint. Ivanov, an
employee of Aerocraft Petrol Management, went through the routine security check
at the entrance to the base, when suddenly – according to the official report
issued by the US military, later debunked – he drew a knife and threatened the
well-armed Zachary Hatfield, a US serviceman. Hatfield shot and killed Ivanov,
although the evidence for the presence of a knife is sketchy. In any case, popular
anger was stoked when the US government offered to compensate Ivanov’s family
– for the princely sum of 2,000 US dollars.

In all US-occupied countries, from
Japan to Iraq to the Manas air force base in remote Kyrgyzstan, the soldiers
of the Empire are protected by treaty from local justice, and shielded by the
base commanders, a policy which encourages the wilding forays that wreak havoc
in surrounding areas. In this case, the killing posed the issue of Kyrgyz sovereignty
in a dramatic way, and the authorities were forced to react, demanding the lifting
of Hatfield’s immunity. This was not granted, but instead, as (the other) Scott
Horton put
it in Harper’s:

“The incident was catastrophically mishandled by U.S. military and diplomatic
personnel. U.S. spokesmen issued a statement claiming that Ivanov had physically
threatened Hatfield with a knife, and that Hatfield shot him in self defense.
While making vague and unconvincing statements of “regret” about the “incident,”
the soldier was whisked away back to the United States. That was flight to avoid
prosecution and to block a homicide investigation–such flight, of course, a
serious crime unto itself. While offering vague assurances that the soldier
would be dealt with under the military justice system (something which, in the
eyes of the Kyrgyz, never occurred), American officials did little to atone
for the crime. Kyrgyz newspapers made mincemeat of the proffered excuse, reporting
that Hatfield’s claims that Ivanov was armed with a knife were untrue and establishing
that Ivanov had made numerous prior deliveries to the base, and was known to
the soldier. The Kyrgyz media fanned suspicions that the homicide was an unprovoked
act, accounts that American officials only fueled by issuing a false report
and failing to convincingly show either contrition or an intention to bring
the soldier to justice.”

The idea that Russia’s agents infiltrated the country, engineered the uprising
from behind the scenes, and succeeded in toppling the Bakiyev government so
that Vladimir Putin could simultaneously gloat and deny responsibility is rather
fanciful, and lacking of proof. A more realistic version of events suggests
a simpler scenario: no Russian conspiracy is required – only the random violence
and official arrogance that surrounds the overseas US military presence wherever
it might be.

The US should immediately recognize the new government, headed by the former
foreign minister, Roza
Otunbayeva, whose reputation as a moderate, pragmatic, relatively Westernized
technocrat is reassuring, albeit no guarantee – there are no guarantees in that
part of the world. In any case, the new government initially indicated Manas
would be closed, and later reversed
course, albeit with reservations. No doubt a long negotiating process will
take place – with the issue of legal immunity of US troops, and not just monetary
compensation, at the center of the discussion.

On this issue, the US imperialists cannot negotiate or give so much as an inch,
because that, after all, is what having an empire is all about. America’s centurions
are answerable to Washington alone: no satrap or protectorate can claim legal
authority over them, or else they’re no longer our soldiers to command. Treaties
granting US military personnel legal immunity from local prosecution are merely
the application of the general principle animating US foreign policy, which
is that America is and must be a law unto itself.

Given this, is it any wonder the family of Mr. Ivanov and many thousands of
Kyrgyz are eager to see us go?

20120296364 Responseshttp%3A%2F%2Foriginal.antiwar.com%2Fjustin%2F2010%2F04%2F08%2Fback-to-kyrgyzstan%2FBack+to+Kyrgyzstan2010-04-09+06%3A00%3A27Justin+Raimondohttp%3A%2F%2Foriginal.antiwar.com%2F%3Fp%3D2012029636 to “Back to Kyrgyzstan”

Was Tailgunner Joe right afterall? Has the bureaucratic powerstructure in DC not been completely consumed from within by the Neo-Commies? Oh, the irony! Where the communists took Russia by consuming socialism, here they did it by consuming "capitalism" (which really ceased to exist some time ago.) The problem in all cases: the masses don't think. Thinking hurts most people's heads. Shame that, but is it human nature or.. the concentration of media? The deregulation mantra has no answer for this. Those who have put their hopes in more deregulation are in for a horrible surprise because at the end of the day there is no productive difference between a government of elected pawns and a government of faceless corporate oligarchs.. except we have at least the hope of displacing the pawns.. but none of removing the monopoly power of the oligarchs once all faint traces of regulation are gone. The obvious answer: regulate, regulate, regulate. Bust the trusts. Destroy the too big to fail "banks" (actually hedge funds now). BREAK UP THE MONOPOLY MEDIA. The only thing that needs completely unregulation is.. the internet. Unfortunately, that's the one thing that every deregulative rightist WANTS to regulate. Gads! Irony abounds.

No, you've got it all wrong. The rightists don't want the guvmint to regulate the internet, they just want the corporations to be able to regulate it. Ya see, there's a big difference between "free market" corporations that can never do anything wrong and big bureaucratic guvmint that can never do anything right (well, unless it's killing fureigners). See, that's why we never see former corporate employees in regulatory agencies or other branches of government and vice verse. Get it?

Oh, and by the way, as I said guvmint can never do anything right. You know, the corollary to that is that if something is run efficiently and I get my benefit check every month, then that must not be the guvmint that's sending me the check. You know, like Social Security and Medicare? That's why we've seen signs that read "guvmint hands off my Medicare."

Justin Raimondo is the editorial director of Antiwar.com, and a senior fellow at the Randolph Bourne Institute. He is a contributing editor at The American Conservative, and writes a monthly column for Chronicles. He is the author of Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement [Center for Libertarian Studies, 1993; Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2000], and An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard [Prometheus Books, 2000].